Shooting The Messenger

Most politically aware Americans know about the massive vote fraud in King County that resulted in the selection of a Democrat to fill the Governor's mansion after a Republican won the election. Well, yesterday King County election officials admitted that at least six-hundred provisional ballots were counted without verifying that they were cast by qualified voters, in addition to the nearly four-hundred extra ballots that exceeded the number of votes cast in the county. That alone is nearly eight times the margin of victory for the selected Democrat.

The response of members of the King County Council? Shoot the messengers.

The dialogue remained civil. In contrast with strong Republican rhetoric in the past about King County goofs in the election, the toughest talk yesterday came from Democrats.

Councilman Dow Constantine, D-Seattle, referring to comparisons made to Chicago's reputation for election fraud, said he had heard enough "loose talk about Cook County — hyperbole about taking names off tombstones and whatnot."

Julia Patterson, D-SeaTac, took "hot talk" radio stations to task, saying, "If there is anything that will undermine people's trust and confidence in our election system, it's those radio stations continuing to lie about fraud in King County."

Yeah, that's right -- the problem is all those conservatives out there talking about vote fraud and the failure to follow the basic requirements of state law. Not the fraud, not the errors, not the fact that King County's vote totals included more votes than ballots cast and unverified voters. The problem is people talking about the problems, not the problems themselves.

Any wonder that most of us view the Democrats as the party of vote fraud.